Family Feud, among other hit-rating shows, has revived Channel Ten with the station counting double-digit prime time ratings growth in every major city.Offspring.

Masterchef Australia.

ANALYSIS

Finally, Channel Ten is getting its mojo back.

Our youngest commercial network, which turns 50 next week, is not out of the woods yet. But it has pulled itself from the brink of the ratings abyss.

Its revived version of Family Feud stunned sceptics with a stellar debut last week, surging past its game show rivals. MasterChef, which had long been on the slide, was Thursday’s No.1 program – giving the show its biggest audience in two years and Ten its first top-ranked position since February. This victory followed popular drama Offspring winning its time slot on Wednesday.

Since Easter, the network has enjoyed double-digit prime time ratings growth in every major city, up by more than one third in Sydney and almost 50 per cent in Melbourne.

All this has given Ten something it desperately needs: mass audiences. It’s a chance to break the vicious cycle sparked by a series of programming blunders a few years ago. Viewership dwindled, leaving fewer people to promote its shows to, and the rot set in.

Broadcast television is not a pure meritocracy, in which viewers simply select the series they like. Success begets success. Networks fret over their early evening game shows because they’re vital in funnelling viewers to their prime-time programs.

It’s early days for Family Feud, which had a combined metropolitan and regional audience of almost 1 million on its first two nights. Viewers like to sample new shows, so its ratings may well soften once the novelty wears off. Its figures are also likely to dip when Ten stops simulcasting it on its digital stations One and Eleven (though it has not confirmed when this will happen).

Already, Nine’s Eddie McGuire has reclaimed the title of top-rating game show host; his Hot Seat program overtook Grant Denyer’s Family Feud on its third outing. (It’s the second time McGuire has crushed a Denyer-led uprising. Last year, the pair were direct rivals, with Denyer’s Million Dollar Minute briefly beating Hot Seat before McGuire snatched back his ratings crown.)

Yet Ten programming chief Beverley McGarvey’s decision to revive the show has undoubtedly paid off. Overnight, it more than doubled the network’s 6pm audience. It has proven popular with lucrative younger viewers, despite fears it would attract a disproportionately older following. It even beat Seven’s news in Sydney last Tuesday.

Ten’s news and current affairs chief Peter Meakin – who previously was at the helm of Seven and Nine’s news teams – also deserves some of the credit for luring Denyer to the network. Despite his dismay at having to axe 150 staff recently, his reputation and expertise have proven valuable.

It was Meakin, for instance, who secured Ian Thorpe’s exclusive ‘‘coming out’’ interview for Ten, which delivered strong ratings and huge publicity. (Not least for Family Feud, with its logo hovering over Thorpe’s neck for the duration of the broadcast.) Fairfax Media has been told that Thorpe’s manager, James Erskine, approached Meakin only, and that Seven and Nine were never seriously in the running.

‘‘MKR is a drama that happens to be around cooking,’’ Allen says. ‘‘MasterChef is a cooking show. It’s gone back to cooking … they’re to be congratulated for it.’’

Ten still has a long way to go. Most nights, it takes fourth place behind the ABC; something that would have been unthinkable a few years ago. And its commercial rivals will not relinquish their market share without a fight. But the signs are good for the network that once raked in more profit than Seven and Nine combined.

According to Allen, Family Feud is ‘‘the best thing Channel Ten has done in three years’’.

‘‘To a large extent, Ten has more interesting things about it than the other networks,’’ he says. ‘‘That’s great for them.’’

Food fight … someone will be going home from the final six. Just desserts … the elimination challenge sent contestants bananas.

Black aprons … Jamie, Ben and Laura face the chop.

Well, this is it folks. The final week of MasterChef. It’s like being in Dallas on the day JKF was shot.

The final six are in the kitchen to “cook their heart out” – and possibly serve it up with a garlic sauce. At stake is foodie immortality – or rather, a forgettable book deal and sponsorship deal with Clingwrap.

Laura, of course, is excited. “It’s not every week, it’s finals week”.

Oh dear, it’s a good thing she can cook, because compelling storytelling is not her strong point.

Brent likens the challenge to being in an athletics race, neatly insulting half the competitors at the Commonwealth Games.

Tracy is “in this to win”. Cool story, Tracy. You should sell the film rights.

The Three Musketeers of the kitchen – Gary, Matt and George, remind everyone of what they’ve just told the cameras – they’re cooking today.

Gary tries to calm everyone down by promising something “nice and gentle” to ease them into the challenge. Which is code for “we’re going to kill you slowly”. So cruel, Gary.

Everyone has a mystery box and everyone’s is different, with a hand-written note from a loved family member. Oh. Dear. God – they are crying now. Everyone is crying as they read out their letters, as if they had been in the trenches in World War I.

Emelia is bawling, reading the words from her mother who calls her “brave”. Brave? Did you beat the Germans with a whisk? No? No, you did not. You do not pass go and you do not get $200, Emelia.

Television producers love tears and they must have been eager for some to be shed in the show’s big last week. Now, Tracy is getting emotional after her husband called her “incredible” for going after her dream. I can’t take this.

Brent’s girlfriend tells him he “deserves this”. What Brent actually deserves is a new hair style – that man-bun does him no favours.

Noses blown, tears wiped, George announces the best three dishes will be saved, while the bottom three will have to cook for their lives in an elimination.

Laura is cooking crispy skin duck breast, dedicating this dish to her dad, a sentiment I’m sure he would appreciate if he could actually eat it.

Brent is annoyed his girlfriend picked ingredients she likes – jeez, you’d think she was sending you a message, Hair-Bun Man. Perhaps “think of me”? Think about it, Brent.

Brent makes a risky move and decides to create panna cotta in just 45 minutes. Will he succeed? The suspense is killing me.

The ad break is on, and a promotion for Mrs Brown’s Boys is showing, ruining the appetite of everyone watching.

Next ad features season one winner, Julie, plugging a washing powder. Ahhh, so that’s where reality television stars go when they are no longer relevant.

Emelia is making Vietnamese snapper with pineapple. She thinks her mum picked the ingredients because she knows she’s done it but she wants to prove she can do more than when she was just in the top 50.

“I don’t want to be in the bottom three today”. Emelia is practically a philosopher at this point.

George has concerns over Laura’s duck and Brent’s panna cotta. I have concerns with George’s burgundy jacket. Really, George?

“She’s really set me up, hasn’t she?” Brent says of his evil girlfriend. I wonder if Brent has cooked with foot and mouth, because that’s all he’s coming up with right now.

Gary asks: “Are you on the money? Do you know what you’re doing?”. Given there’s 10 minutes to go, this seems an odd question. Shouldn’t you have asked that 35 minutes ago Gary?

Brent is still wearing “my girlfriend is mean” face – his panna cottas are stuck in their mould. Plot twist! I never could have seen that one coming.

Tracy wants her thighs to be perfect and needs to strain off her sauce – um, is this a cooking show or a something best left for after 9.30pm and preferably on SBS?

Brent has resorted to using a blowtorch to loosen those stubborn panna cottas. But success is at hand, his dessert is saved. Now the schlub is smiling.

“Thank-you for giving me dessert, Maddy”. I sense Maddy won’t appreciate this last-minute turnaround after Brent practically accused her of sabotaging him and spoiling the end of the latest Spiderman movie.

Uh oh, Tracy has poured her special sauce all over the chopping board and looks like one of those people who claims to have just witnessed aliens in the sky.

“Oh my god,” she says, hands over her head. It’s okay Tracy – just get some paper towels. Tracy refuses to take my practical advice and continues to look like she’s about to lose her mind.

First up to show off his pan-seared quail is Jamie, which is now minus the breasts because they were too dry. Matt tells him off for the teeny tiny portion but eats it anyway – rude. Gary loves the “variation of beetroots” but he wants the breast’s “meaty juices”. Oh my, I feel a bit flustered now.

Emelia is up and her snapper is deemed “extraordinary”.

Tracy knew her dish was “smashing” but her stuff-up could cost her. Spacey Tracy is back! George pulls his cravat off – I never knew he actually had a neck – to make George’s point that “something is missing” from her dish. Yeah, we knew that, George. No need for drama of Charlie Sheen proportions.

Ben’s dish “looks a bit weird”, says Matt. The fatty duck is overcooked and the polenta has soaked up too much sauce. If this was gladiator-era Rome, then it would be a thumbs down. And then death by angry tiger.

But this is MasterChef, so punishment is having to take a bath in your own tears.

Laura, also serving up duck, has done better, which wouldn’t be hard. Gary loves her mashed potato but the duck is overcooked, too. I blame the ducks at this point.

Whinging Brent is up and his dish looks good. That’s because it is good. George beams.

Everyone has been judged and the gods have spoken – Brent is the winner, along with Emelia and … they cut to an ad break.

We’re back and … it’s Tracy. The space cadet of the kitchen has won, even though she didn’t get everything on the plate.

So it’s now an elimination challenge – Ben, Laura and Jamie are handed black aprons.

Three of Australia’s “most cutting-edge” chefs walk through the door like sugared angels of death to help the trio.

The dessert is so long and complicated I didn’t have time to write it down. It looks like food Lego.

It’s a banana split but in disguise – the banana is actually a banana-shaped and coloured coffee and banana gelato foam that looks like cream and a chocolate and peanut sauce. Sounds good. FYI, I ate microwaved risotto for dinner, so I’m totally up on these skillz.

At this point, I feel sorry for these three losers. If I were among them, I would whip off that black apron and march out singing a Beyonce tune. This grown woman ain’t having none of that.

Jamie, Ben and Laura have two hours to recreate this Frank Gehry of desserts. Ben looks like he wants to cry, which for once, I’m okay with. Wave that white flag, Ben.

They’re off! All their ingredients are on the bench and they’re making gelato. Meanwhile, I’m eating Nutella from a jar.

Now, Jamie is using words like “foam”, “straining” and “Malibu”. I’m so confused. He’s already feeling confident five minutes in, which we all know is the kiss of death on this show. Smooth move, Jamie. He should be tearing his hipster hair out by the next ad break.

Laura is “all over the place” and has already stuffed up. Oops. But she refuses to start again and takes a “massive risk” by adjusting the recipe. Smooth move, Laura.

The three angels of death are visiting Laura, who is explaining her shortcuts. They are not impressed. “I’m in a lot of trouble,” she says. “I’m definitely starting to get really behind.”

Jamie cooks his bananas with a splash of “duh”, telling the cameras: “I’m trying to get everything done as quickly as possible”.

But he’s put the gelato in the blast freezer instead of the normal freezer – blast! He’s just done a Laura.

Ben’s parfait has turned to scrambled eggs, after he took his eyes off the stove for two seconds. That sounds like a food transformation of Jesus proportions. What Would Ben Do?

Everyone is suffering from brain bubbles. This is just sad now, like watching toddlers fight for the last crayon on Earth. It almost kills my joy of being mean to them. Almost.

Ben is back on track and within one second, isn’t again. Make up your mind, Ben – are you good at this or not? I’m getting whiplash.

“We are all biting our nails willing you to finish,” says Gary.

The five-minute countdown is on. Everyone is cooking their sauce and offering a prayer to the food god – aka Jamie Oliver – to save them.

Time is up and now they can walk away from their very own Food Olympics. Jamie is assembling his “banana split” in front of the judges. It’s tasting time and there are three men sitting at a table wearing stupid grins. They like it. Actually, George loves it. Jamie’s “packed a lot of flavour in”. Interpret that as you wish, ladies and gentlemen.

Ben is nervous as he wears the Bob the Builder hat and George asks him what his gut is telling him about his effort. My guess is “anxious”, closely followed by “hungry”.

Tasting the dish, Matt is unimpressed and George looks sceptical. Gary praises the gelato but George and Matt say the sauce is a mess – it’s separated and fatty.

Now it’s Laura’s turn. I had forgotten about her. But the smiling pixie of the group is wheeling up her goodies and giving it a red hot go. You be you, Laura.

“Are you going home?” Gary asks. Wow, way to be grateful to someone who’s just served you food. Has Laura’s risk at tweaking the recipe when it went banana shaped worked? The judges love it, although her foam lacks flavour.

Clearly, it’s between Ben and Laura on who will walk out in shame, and then cry and proclaim, “Australia, you haven’t seen the last of me!”. Has that line ever worked for anyone from a reality TV show?

Before we find out, there’s an ad for King Island cheese, where the cheese maker actually hugs a wheel of cheese. I have never been so envious of another person before.

Back to the show and Jamie is safe. Wow, didn’t see that one coming. He and his hipster hair can relax now.

After a tongue lashing, Ben is told he’s going home. “It’s been an unbelievable experience I’ll never forget,” he says, before being asked his favourite moments. I’m guessing this won’t be one of them.

Six started this episode. Only five have survived. The judges promise us “no rules” in the next episode, which I’m interpreting as “you don’t have to wear pants”. I’m totally tuning in for that.

This story Administrator ready to work first appeared on Nanjing Night Net.

PUBLIC CONCERNS: Whyalla City Council chief executive officer Peter Peppin says the council should have told residents of its decision to transfer stockpiled mulch to the Newton Street site.Whyalla City Council has conceded it should have told its residents about the transfer of stockpiled mulch to the Newton Street site.

Following an outpouring of disgust from local residents,including member for Giles Eddie Hughes, Whyalla City Council admitted residents should have been notified.

Mr Hughes said it would have been far more “preferable and professional” for the mulch to have beencleaned up before it was spread.

He said using the mulch in its current state did not represent good practice and questioned the council’s decision making.

Whyalla City Council chief executive officer Peter Peppin said the council acknowledged the public concerns about the mulch being spread on the site before the “removal” of “non-organic” materials such as plastic.

“Significantly, the Environmental Protection Authority has advised that processing of such material to ensure the removal of all non-organics is difficult,” Mr Peppin said.

“That is the reason for spreading it on the site.

“Once all the stockpiled mulch is spread, it enables us to remove the plastics and any other non-organics before covering the mulch with top soil.”

Mr Peppin said the benefits of the procedure were less cost to the community and lesser impact on the environment.

This story Administrator ready to work first appeared on Nanjing Night Net.

Police are investigating a suspicious fire that destroyed a carport at a Goolwa South property on Saturday, July 19. Police are investigating a suspicious fire that destroyed a carport at a Goolwa South property on Saturday, July 19.

Police and fire crews were called to Colman Road, Goolwa South, at 4.15am and found a car alight. The fire had spread to the carport and to the eaves of the house, butwas extinguished bya neighbourbefore itspread any further.

Sally Pearson, Alex Rowe and Benn Harradine had all done the right thing, the sensible thing, the smart thing … so of course they had to be fined.

An athlete can be at once right and wrong according to the perverse logic of Athletics Australia.

The athletes’ smart decision was to not attend the team’s Gateshead camp by a deadline date and instead go out to compete. Good idea AA said. Well done. Whatever is best to get you right.

Oh, but by the way, we won’t give you any money if you don’t at least walk through the camp.

These are not the sport’s minnows. Sally Pearson has held the sport together for years. She is one of the greatest athletes Australia has seen. She should be entitled flexibility to get herself right. The pre-games funding is after all for preparation, not pocket money to spend at the Gateshead tuckshop.

Harradine is trying to defend his Commonwealth Gold medal and Alex Rowe has in days become a significant figure.

Rowe’s run in the 800m on Friday night was thrilling. He ran quicker than any Australian man in 46 years and matched one of the most storied – and enduring – national records on the track.

AA – rightly – spent the weekend tweeting and proudly boasting of Rowe’s performance in recording the same time as Ralph Doubell then – wrongly – sanctioned him for being in the race in the first place.

Rowe will lose a third of the funding he might have got, or about $860. It is not a large amount of money (which is also precisely the point about why it is being quibbled over in the first case) but this is the funding for a 22-year-old university student athlete who as yet still does not have a shoe sponsorship.

Ridiculously Rowe would not have lost funding if he had flown into Gateshead, clocked in and flown out again for Monaco.

Pearson will also lose a third of her bit of this funding, but she was on a larger rate so her chunk of cash is slightly more. She can better afford it than Rowe, but that is not the point.

Amusingly, the person who made this rule and was presented to explain the crushingly ironic logic of this situation, Simon Nathan, carries the title of high performance manager. What the athletes all did was, the high performance manager admitted, the best thing for their high performance.

To be fair, he at least had the decency to look sheepish and personally unconvinced by the conflicted position he had knotted himself into.

“I know it probably doesn’t look like it or feel like it (but) we are a sensible organisation,” he said.

It didn’t help that he then quoted the wrong figure for how much out of pocket Rowe was to be (he’s out a third of his money like the other two but for Rowe’s funding level that equates to $860 not the $1300 that Nathan said.)

AA has a profound capacity to seize disaster from the glorious. This is the same organisation that this year was not funding Melissa Breen when she became the fastest Australian woman ever and then waited months before giving her a fraction of the funding she should have been entitled to.

The same one that had to be bullied by the Australian Olympic Committee to add Genevieve La Caze to the London Olympic team when she ran a qualifying time moments after an arbitrary final deadline had past.

The reason that those farces occurred is the same reason that this stupidity has been allowed to manifest: because AA has been stubbornly blind to common sense. They have now allowed the greatness of Rowe’s performance to be overshadowed by the niggardly and doctrinaire.

The premise of the idea to tie funding to attend the camp is a good one, but it needed to be a flexible one. The rules when introduced were meritorious, as AA wanted to stop athletes thumbing their nose at the sport and splintering off into small camps with their own coaches.

Rightly AA said ‘if you want to do your own thing, that is fine, just don’t ask us to pay for it’.

But that is not what these athletes were doing. Rowe and Harradine both arrived at the camp but only after competing. They were a little late.

Pearson would have been at the camp too but only decided late to accept the offer to compete in the Anniversary Games because she knows that after her hamstring twitch she needs races more than camps.

They were all doing the right thing. The sensible thing. The smart thing. It was their sporting body that was not.

This story Administrator ready to work first appeared on Nanjing Night Net.

And stage 15 of the Tour de France was meant be a transition one? All I can say is that I’m glad to get it behind us. It was nuts. Even before it started raining, it was crazy with the wind … The only thing we didn’t have on Sunday was snow.

It was an amazing stage with all the conditions that saw blue skies turn to black as the storms rolled over us, to the echelons caused by the winds and nervous energy inside a clearly tiring peloton that is racing to the Tour finish in Paris on Sunday.

Probably leaving the biggest impact of all the weather gods threw at us was the rain. It pelted down so hard you couldn’t see through your glasses, and then when you took them off, the spraying of rain blinded you – not to mention hurt as it hit you.

It didn’t help that over the last five kilometres there were about five roundabouts, made all the more treacherous by rainfall making them more slippery and tougher to pass.

This sort of finale is never easy in any race, let alone after two weeks of a grand tour.

It may look like we are coasting, but in the back of our minds we are always thinking of the finale, and if not about winning it as the sprinters’ teams would have been on stage 15, then of surviving it unscathed for time loss in any late splits or crashes.

It is always dangerous, and in such circumstances you can never afford to switch off.

For me, with the goal of a top overall classification behind me, the main aim was to regroup from the mayhem and finish as fresh as possible so as to have a chance of recovering from my chest infection on the rest day in Carcassonne.

Which I can say I did with the official results showing I finished in 70th place at 16s to the stage 15 winner, Norwegian Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) who won in a sprint.

With a rest day on Monday that I am really looking forward to, I am still in 15th position overall, but now at 16m 19s to the Italian race leader, Vincenzo Nibali (Astana).

Obviously, this rest day will be different from last Tuesday’s when I was still placed second overall and excited about what may happen.

Now I am sick and trying to recover from a chest infection. But I think everybody in the peloton is happy for the rest day to come, and there are a lot of guys sick in the peloton.

I’ll be honest. When I look back at what happened with me – irrespective of my illness – the worst thing is knowing that it has been a big opportunity missed.

But there is nothing I can do about it, and my health is the most important really.

What I will do differently this rest day, compared to last week’s day off, is to really make sure that I spend a lot of it resting and recuperating.

I really hope if I do that, I can knock this bug off before the Pyrenees that start on Tuesday with stage 16.

I have copped a bit from some people saying that I am not up to it [the podium], but at that top level if you are not 100 per cent you lose time.

Cycling is too hard a sport to avoid being caught out when your health is not optimal.

My health hasn’t been and you can see what happens.

But finishing this Tour in Paris is still a major goal for me – and who knows, along the way if I can recover enough – maybe I can muster the strength to try for a late stage victory in the Pyrenees.

If not … so be it. This is all experience in the bank which I hope sometime will pay off.

This story Administrator ready to work first appeared on Nanjing Night Net.